NTSPP – 004

Not the Saturday Prize Puzzle – 004

A Bonus Puzzle by Anax

Welcome to the fourth in what has become an excellent series of weekly puzzles. Telegraph setters themselves have been known to dip in, perhaps to see how it really should be done!

This one dropped unexpectedly into my mailbox recently. Anax thought he would try his hand at writing an easier puzzle. Easier that what? You might well ask. Easier than his usual fare. Is it easy – that’s for you to judge.

Setter’s Notes

In setting this one I gave myself the brief of keeping things as simple as possible, which is quite a departure from the typical Anax approach.

So what’s the point in setting out to write an easy cryptic crossword? There’s a very simple answer to that – writing easy cryptics is harder than writing tough ones. Going tough allows you to make use of every cryptic device and to be as devious as you wish. The rules of cryptic clue-writing offer the setter a vast array of weaponry, but the easier a puzzle is intended to be the fewer of those weapons are available for use.

Some solvers complain that puzzles by, for example, Rufus (Roger Squires) are too easy. Given that Roger is setting for an audience comparatively new to crosswords, I believe more appreciation should be shown for the fact that what he does so well is actually incredibly hard to achieve.

Matching that skill is beyond me, but this puzzle is an attempt to create something more accessible than my usual stuff. Have I succeeded? Well, I’d really like to know! All comments are welcome, but in particular I’d be interested to know how your solving time for this compared against other crosswords you regularly solve.